Dyspeptic retired Marine wife/tech wench attempts to enlighten the great unwashed of the blogosphere while dodging snarky commentary from the local knavery.

August 17, 2008

McCain: Senile, But *Really* Quick on His Feet...

...according to Andrea Mitchell, McCain is too dumb to have outperformed Obama in a debate using his two and a half decades of Senate experience. But oddly enough the senile old fart is smart enough to assemble answers out of thin air given just a few minutes' lead time:

MR. GREGORY: Andrea Mitchell, that's a pretty clear contrast.

MS. ANDREA MITCHELL: Oh, absolutely. And, you know, there was the crisp, immediate, forceful response by John McCain, clearly in a comfort zone because he was with his base. And Barack Obama, taking a risk in going there but seeing an opportunity. And a much more nuanced approach. The Obama people must feel that he didn't do quite as well as they might have wanted to in that context, because that -- what they're putting out privately is that McCain may not have been in the cone of silence and may have had some ability to overhear what the questions were to Obama.

MR. GREGORY: Right.

MS. MITCHELL: He seemed so well prepared.

In other words, there is only one rational explanation for McCain being able to beat The Lightworker.

1) It was unsubstantiated, and as we all know, the media would never run with such a serious allegation until it was thoroughly researched.

2) Except, of course, if it comes directly from the Obama campaign (in which the normal evidentiary burdens are waived). After all, what possible motive could the Democratic candidate have for spreading a malicious rumor about his opponent?

Posted by Cassandra at August 17, 2008 09:17 PM

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Ok, who really cheated: This is fromt eh transcript:

Warren: WOULD YOU BE WILLING TO CONSIDER AND EVEN COMMIT TO DOING SOME KIND OF EMERGENCY PLAN FOR ORPHANS LIKE PRESIDENT BUSH DID WITH AIDS ALMOST A PRESIDENT'S EMERGENCY PLAN FOR ORPHANS TO DEAL WITH THIS ISSUE?
Obama: I CHEATED A LITTLE BIT. I ACTUALLY LOOKED AT THIS IDEA AHEAD OF TIME AND I THINK IT IS A -- I THINK IT'S A GREAT IDEA.

So did they cheat or did they get the questions ahead of time is what I want to know

Is there any corroborating evidence that the Obama campaign is suggesting such a thing? It seems like a pretty stupid remark to make (assuming that Andrea Mitchell is telling the truth) when they have so little to lose over this particular event.

Everyone gets the stupid bug from time to time, Bill. That's not really evidence for this particular claim.

However, here's Frank Rich's take on McCain's "economic stupidity". Just a snippet, and then a link to the full op/ed:

"The term flip-flopping doesn’t do justice to Mr. McCain’s self-contradictory economic pronouncements because that implies there’s some rational, if hypocritical, logic at work. What he serves up instead is plain old incoherence, as if he were compulsively consulting one of those old Magic 8 Balls. In a single 24-hour period in April, Mr. McCain went from saying there’s been “great economic progress” during the Bush presidency to saying “Americans are not better off than they were eight years ago.” He reversed his initial condemnation of mortgage bailouts in just two weeks.

In February Mr. McCain said he would balance the federal budget by the end of his first term even while extending the gargantuan Bush tax cuts. In April he said he’d accomplish this by the end of his second term. In July he’s again saying he’ll do it in his first term. Why not just say he’ll do it on Inauguration Day? It really doesn’t matter since he’s never supplied real numbers that would give this promise even a patina of credibility.

Mr. McCain’s plan for Social Security reform is “along the lines that President Bush proposed.” Or so he said in March. He came out against such “privatization” in June (though his policy descriptions still support it). Last week he indicated he isn’t completely clear on what Social Security does. He called the program’s premise — young taxpayers foot the bill for their elders (including him) — an “absolute disgrace.”

Both candidates had the first few questions in advance of the debate, Jeffrey. You know, during the time when McCain was in that motorcade? Supposedly getting some unbelievable advantage from listening in on the questions both he and Obama already had way in advance.

And then he made a joke to cover it up because he know the Daily Kos would eventually catch him red handed.

The Obama people must feel that he didn't do quite as well as they might have wanted to in that context, because that -- what they're putting out privately is that McCain may not have been in the cone of silence and may have had some ability to overhear what the questions were to Obama...[McCain] seemed so well prepared.

This is the way it looks when someone actually is well prepared, Andrea. He was well-prepared, but not by cheating. McCain has had his own thoughts for some time now, has experienced life, done some reading besides Sports Illustrated, has sought out information on the world all on his own. In fact, he made trips to Georgia to learn about them years ago, so he already had knowledge about them and their precarious situation the day they got run over by Russia. He didn't have to Google "Georgia", and he already knew that it was not the state to the north of Florida. In his pursuit of knowledge over the years, he has come to some heartfelt conclusions.

This is the way it looks when someone knows who he is and what he believes. It only looks like cheating to a person who doesn't know what he thinks until he reads it on his teleprompter.

Oh, and BTW, the Cone of Silence is a comedic device from a 1960's sitcom, and it never worked. YouTube is your friend, Andrea.

...the Cone of Silence is a comedic device from a 1960's sitcom, and it never worked.

Actually, the Cone of Silence is the airspace directly above a non-directional radio navigation beacon. The cone is "dead air" because the antenna broadcasts laterally quite well, but doesn't transmit straight up worth a darn.

The Corner has up a post that seems to cover all the angles on this. With regard to what the candidates were told by Warren: both candidates knew the first two questions; Obama also knew about the adoption question but McCain did not (nothing sinister just logistics); both candidates knew all four categories and were given general pointers on the sorts of questions that would be asked.

With regard to whether McCain heard part of Obama's Q&A, McCain was in a motorcade for part of Obama's session. His staff says he did not hear any of Obama's session. Once arrived at Saddleback, McCain was in a room with staff people and no audio or video. I suppose if you're determined to do so, you can claim McCain was listening in while in the motorcade but that's a substantial lie for him and his staffers to tell.

BTW - the McCain campaign is protesting NBC’s coverage of the campaign in general and citing Mitchell's remarks as particularly egregious. In a letter to NBC, campaign manager Rick Davis said:

Make no mistake: This is a serious charge. Andrea Mitchell is repeating, uncritically, a completely unsubstantiated Obama campaign claim that John McCain somehow cheated in last night's forum at Saddleback Church. Instead of trying to substantiate this blatant falsehood in any way, Andrea Mitchell felt that she needed to repeat it on air to millions of "Meet the Press" viewers with no indication that 1.) There's not one shred of evidence that it's true;...

I have not, however, seen anything that definitively proves this claim came from the Obama campaign. It would be interesting to press Mitchell on that point.

I have to say, I think the McCain campaign owes the Clinton campaign big time for providing a roadmap of where to push back against the Obama campaign and for laying the groundwork for that push back. Surely the perception (at least) that a good part of the media was openly (and often vociferously) backing Obama against Clinton makes it easier for the McCain campaign to call NBC on this kind of thing.

But I do wonder if anyone kept count of the "umm, er, ah" by each of the candidates. I did count a few from Obama (during the Thomas moment (where Thomas is clearly unqualified, while Scalia is a legal genius)).

Obama's pauses ("Um, that's a good question .....") mark someone for whom every question is brand new and takes serious thought. Experienced men have already faced the questions and can tell us what they think.